![\"Craig](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aap.com.au\/f5a8f442c3b9761fde6443d78cca9921.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\nMelbourne coach Craig Bellamy has given “valuable servant” Cameron Munster his personal blessing to sign with PNG for their inaugural NRL season.<\/p>\n
Munster is out of contract after 2027 and, in recent days, the Storm have granted the veteran five-eighth early permission to negotiate with the Chiefs.<\/p>\n
Melbourne’s most-capped active player, Munster may yet ink a contract extension to remain with the Storm for 2028 and beyond<\/p>\n
But the 31-year-old can now entertain advances from the NRL’s forthcoming 19th team, who are already assembling an impressive roster that features Jarome Luai, Alex Johnston and Connor Watson.<\/p>\n
Munster commands a seven-figure salary at the Storm but the chance for tax-free windfall at the Chiefs could be life-changing for the Queensland captain as he draws nearer to retirement.<\/p>\n
Having won two premierships across 251 appearances for the Storm, Munster would have enough credits in the bank to leave on good terms.<\/p>\n
“‘Mun’ has done a whole heap for our club and he’s done it over a long period of time,” said Bellamy, who handed Munster his NRL debut in 2014.<\/p>\n
“He’s been a wonderful player with our club, so if he sees that he wants to go to the team in Papua New Guinea … I’d be happy to let him go.”<\/p>\n
A decision on Munster’s future will come down to discussions between agent Braith Anasta, Storm football manager Frank Ponissi and chief executive Justin Rodski.<\/p>\n
“I don’t know whether they’ll be (making) the same decision as me but he’s done a lot for our club, ‘Mun’,” Bellamy said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Coach Craig Bellamy (centre) says he’d be happy to let Cameron Munster (right) go to PNG team. (James Ross\/AAP PHOTOS)<\/p>\n
“He’s been a valuable servant and very loyal. So if he wants to do that and that’s going to help him in later life, well, I’m willing to say, ‘Yeah, okay’.<\/p>\n
“We’ll just see what happens but I’ll go on the record as saying if he wants to go and his family wants to go, well, he goes with my blessing.”<\/p>\n
Storm captain Harry Grant felt it made sense for Munster to begin contemplating his future during his current lay-off with a knee injury.<\/p>\n
Players coming into the final year of their contract can typically begin negotiating with rival clubs from November 1.<\/p>\n
But Munster is likely to be playing for Australia at the World Cup between October and November this year.<\/p>\n
“It’ll probably be a bit of a busy time towards the end of the year with the World Cup and everything like that, so I think it’s not a bad time for him to have that look,” Grant said.<\/p>\n
“The NRL have brought a couple of new teams in so I don’t think you can hold (grudges against) players for having that opportunity to talk to them.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Melbourne coach Craig Bellamy has given “valuable servant” Cameron Munster his personal blessing to sign with PNG for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":821461,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,4567,8089,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-821460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cameron-munster","tag-craig-bellamy","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=821460"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821460\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/821461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=821460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=821460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=821460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}